Five Best File Compression Tools

7-Zip (Windows/Linux, Free)

7-Zip is a free, open-source file archive utility with a spare interface but powerful feature set. With support for most popular compression formats (and quite a few not-so-popular), this lightweight, open source option does the job quickly and without fuss. While some 7-Zip users complain about its spare interface, others are happy with 7-Zip's no-nonsense approach and fast operation.




IZArc (Windows, Freeware)

IZArc is the compression tool that may take home the prize for most-supported read and write formats for this Hive Five. IZArc is also the only featured archiver apart from PeaZip that distributes a portable version on their web site (though third parties have made other apps portable—like 7-Zip Portable). Users go for IZArc for its attractive interface and its low pricetag. IZArc is freeware, but donations are accepted.



WinRAR (Windows, Shareware)

WinRAR is a powerful file compression and decompression tool that's been around since 1993. As the first result in a Google search for RAR, it's probably the first option most of us stumbled onto when we ran into our first RAR file. That said, WinRAR supports a wide range of formats. It's also one of the few archivers capable of writing RAR archives—though overall it's limited to creating only RARs or ZIPs. WinRAR costs a pretty steep $29 for a license, but several users are happy to suffer through the nag screens to avoid the cost.




PeaZip (Windows and Linux, Free)

PeaZip is a free and open-source archive manager that supports a boatload of formats. Unlike its open-source sister, 7-Zip, PeaZip also has a very attractive interface, from the main application interface down to the desktop icons it uses when you set it as your default compression tool. Like IZArc, it's also available in a portable version—so even if you don't go with it for your default, it's worth tossing on your thumb drive just in case you need a little compression on the road.



The Unarchiver (Mac OS X, Freeware)

The Unarchiver is the built-in default file compression utility for Mac OS X. Unlike Windows, which only supports the ZIP format out-of-the-box, The Unarchiver handles most major formats. The catch: The Unarchiver is a read-only application, so if you're on a Mac and you want to write to more obscure archive types than ZIP, you may need to add an extra tool to your arsenal. Most OS X users, however, are happy to stick with The Unarchiver for all their decompression needs.



Source: http://lifehacker.com/#!5065324/five-best-file-compression-tools%27

Who Drove The First Floppy Disk Drive

In 1971, IBM introduced the first "memory disk", as it was called then, or the "floppy disk" as it is known today.

8-inch Floppy Disk

The first floppy was an 8-inch flexible plastic disk coated with magnetic iron oxide; computer data was written to and read from the disk's surface.

The nickname "floppy" came from the disk's flexibility. The floppy disk was considered a revolutionary device in the "History of Computers" for its portability which provided a new and easy physical means of transporting data from computer to computer.

Inventor Alan Shugart

The "floppy" was invented by IBM engineers led by Alan Shugart. The first disks were designed for loading microcodes into the controller of the Merlin (IBM 3330) disk pack file (a 100 MB storage device). So, in effect, the first floppies were used to fill another type of data storage device. Overnight, additional uses for the floppy were discovered, making it the hot new program and file storage medium.

How Does a Floppy Work?

A floppy is a circle of magnetic material similar to other kinds of recording tape such as cassette tape; one or two sides of the disk are used for recording. The disk drive grabs the floppy by its center and spins it like a record inside its housing. The read/write head, much like the head on a tape deck, contacts the surface through an opening in the plastic shell, or envelope. The first Shugart floppy held 100 KBs of data.

* First-hand account of how the operating system for the 8-inch disk was written.

5 1/4-inch Floppy Disk

In 1976, the 5 1/4" flexible disk drive and diskette was developed by Alan Shugart for Wang Laboratories. Wang wanted a smaller floppy disk and drive to use with their desktop computers. By 1978, more than 10 manufacturers were producing 5 1/4" floppy drives that stored up to 1.2MB (megabytes) of data.

One interesting story about the 5 1/4-inch floppy disk is how the size was decided. Engineers, Jim Adkisson and Don Massaro were discussing the size with An Wang of Wang Laboratories. The trio just happened to be doing their discussing at a bar. An Wang motioned to a drink napkin and stated "about that size" which happened to be 5 1/4-inches wide.

3 1/2-inch Floppy Disk

In 1981, Sony introduced the first 3 1/2" floppy drives and diskettes. These floppies were encased in hard plastic, however, the name stayed the same. They stored 400kb of data, and later 720K (double-density) and 1.44MB (high-density).

Post Floppy Disk

For the most part, recordable CDs and DVDs, and flash drives have replaced floppies as the means of transporting files from one computer to another computer.



Source: http://inventors.about.com/od/computersandinternet/a/FloppyDisk.htm

Hard disk buying guide

Today, the spaces for internal hard disk are getting bigger and bigger, it can be store up to 500 Gigabtyes but it also can meet the need of the consumer, so many hardware company had invented the uses of external hard disk to store the information. However, due to the many layer in the society, the company also design the hard disk different purpose, mainly is categorized it for company uses and home uses.

What criteria should you looking for your external hard disk for personal use:

1. Interface

Normally, the company provided the external hard disk into three different interface, which is PATA, SATA and SATA2. The PATA is the slowest interface which is low transfer speed, while the SATA2is the fastest interface which can transfer data in the rate up to 3GB per second and SATA is 1.5GB per second. So, when you buy a hard disk, you should looking for the terms of either PATA, SATA and SATA2 because it can affect you transfer rate.

          2.Size

The size of external hard disk is refer to the size of the storage you want to use. In this case, the size is the major factor that affect you buying decision because now a day, the company had provides variety of size you can choose, which from 50 GB up to 1 TB.

3.RPM

RPM reflects of the revolution per minute, it means the higher RPM of your hard disk, the higher the transfer speed because it depands on speed of the drive platter spins.

4.Size of hard disk

Today, many sizes of the hard disk are introduced in the market, which normally are 2.5'' and 3.5''. The different between 2 size is the 2.5'' are smaller and easy to caring while the 3.5'' are bigger and heavy as a netbook. Besides that, 3.5'' hard disk are need to connect with power supply but 2.5''hard disk is not. Last but not least, the 3.5'' are likely to provide more space than 2.5''. So, before buying decision make, you should able to know how much space yo need from external hard disk.

In conclusion, those criteria that mentioned in top is the information you need to looking for when buying a external hard disk. So, hope this information can be your guideline when buying a hard disk. Thank you...